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Willpower: Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength

Roy F. Baumeister, John Tierney · 7 HN comments
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Amazon Summary
One of the world's most esteemed and influential psychologists, Roy F. Baumeister, teams with New York Times science writer John Tierney to reveal the secrets of self-control and how to master it. In Willpower, the pioneering researcher Roy F. Baumeister collaborates with renowned New York Times science writer John Tierney to revolutionize our understanding of the most coveted human virtue: self-control. In what became one of the most cited papers in social science literature, Baumeister discovered that willpower actually operates like a muscle: it can be strengthened with practice and fatigued by overuse. Willpower is fueled by glucose, and it can be bolstered simply by replenishing the brain's store of fuel. That's why eating and sleeping- and especially failing to do either of those-have such dramatic effects on self-control (and why dieters have such a hard time resisting temptation). Baumeister's latest research shows that we typically spend four hours every day resisting temptation. No wonder people around the world rank a lack of self-control as their biggest weakness. Willpower looks to the lives of entrepreneurs, parents, entertainers, and artists-including David Blaine, Eric Clapton, and others-who have flourished by improving their self-control. The lessons from their stories and psychologists' experiments can help anyone. You learn not only how to build willpower but also how to conserve it for crucial moments by setting the right goals and using the best new techniques for monitoring your progress. Once you master these techniques and establish the right habits, willpower gets easier: you'll need less conscious mental energy to avoid temptation. That's neither magic nor empty self-help sloganeering, but rather a solid path to a better life. Combining the best of modern social science with practical wisdom, Baumeister and Tierney here share the definitive compendium of modern lessons in willpower. As our society has moved away from the virtues of thrift and self-denial, it often feels helpless because we face more temptations than ever. But we also have more knowledge and better tools for taking control of our lives. However we define happiness-a close- knit family, a satisfying career, financial security-we won't reach it without mastering self-control.
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Mar 22, 2012 · boofar on Todon't app
Half-relevant: Funnily, I just arrived at this passage in "Willpower: Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength"[1]:

"We devoted chapter 3 to the glorious history of the to-do list, but we realize that some readers might still not feel like drawing one up. It can sound dreary and off-putting. If so, try thinking of it as a todon’t list: a catalog of things that you don’t have to worry about once you write them down. As we saw in our discussion of the Zeigarnik effect, when you try to ignore unfinished tasks, your unconscious keeps fretting about them in the same way that an ear worm keeps playing an unfinished song. You can’t banish them from your brain by procrastinating or by willing yourself to forget them. But once you make a specific plan, your unconscious will be mollified. You need to at least plan the specific next step to take: what to do, whom to contact, how to do it (in person? by phone? by e-mail?). If you can also plan specifically when and where to do it, so much the better, but that’s not essential. As long as you’ve decided what to do and put it on the list, your unconscious can relax."

[1]: http://www.amazon.com/Willpower-Rediscovering-Greatest-Human...

That research eventually turned into a great book: http://www.amazon.com/Willpower-Rediscovering-Greatest-Human...

Probably the most useful bit or research (also described much less technically in that book) is this:http://books.google.com/books?id=7CeE67IrVDUC&pg=PA130&#...

Oct 28, 2011 · lpolovets on "Willpower" book notes
I read Willpower (http://www.amazon.com/Willpower-Rediscovering-Greatest-Human...) recently and took extensive book notes. A few of my friends enjoyed the notes and thought they might be of interest to the HN crowd.
Here is what I did. Perhaps it would work for you:

- Create a todo list. Each thing must be specific, measurable and unambiguous. Update it every day, first thing. - Grab a copy of "Will Power": http://www.amazon.com/Willpower-Rediscovering-Greatest-Human... Awesome book. - Find someone to work with, or an accountability group. Working with someone is a great motivator for me. - Track your time. See how much time you're spending on which thing, (or nothing). - If you've been procrastinating on something or more than a month, then maybe you should remove it from your list. - Have a clear understanding of where you're going and why. Perhaps your expectations of yourself are too high?

Oct 16, 2011 · chugger on Tired of Being Tired
I use to not eat breakfast everyday for 18+ years. it was something I just didn't do. It wasn't until 2 years ago that I started feeling the effects: chronic fatigue, I was always feeling lethargic, etc. eating breakfast changed everything (a healthy diet really).

Check out this book about Willpower and the role of glucose. http://www.amazon.com/Willpower-Rediscovering-Greatest-Human...

Evgeny
Well I'm not eating breakfast quite often and it does not affect me in any negative way - more like the opposite.

If it took you 18+ years to feel negative effects of not having breakfast, I would probably check any other changes that happened recently first.

As a counter argument, here's a couple of links on why you should not eat breakfast, but feel free to disagree.

http://www.gnolls.org/2131/the-breakfast-myth-part-1/ http://www.gnolls.org/2181/the-breakfast-myth-part-2-the-art...

The article was written by one of the coauthors of Willpower (http://www.amazon.com/Willpower-Rediscovering-Greatest-Human...). I read this book last week and it was terrific. A great blend of fascinating studies and practical advice. Also, while many pop psych books rehash the same studies over and over, Willpower featured many results that I had not encountered before, like these findings about parole hearings. Highly recommended book.
snitko
Couldn't agree more, a great book. As far as I understood it was written by a journalist, but a journalist closely working with scientists. He tells a great story and it definitely is nothing like Gladwell speculations.
A really excellent followup to the study that was linked to around here about 6 months ago that found out "willpower" is an exhaustible resource that needs to be managed throughout your day.

The book[1] this article is reviewing discusses learning to exercise your will power through little mini tasks throughout the day (sit up straight, don't curse, don't eat the whole cake, pickup your desk before going to lunch, etc.) as a means of strengthening that skill.

In their studies they found that employing little tasks like that actually made the willpower muscle (let's call it) stronger, leading to more control over your day.

As to "why do I care?" both studies show that people with more willpower generally end up happier with their lives.

This article does make an interesting point that people with ultimate willpower are not markedly happier than people with nominal amounts of it, so you don't necessarily need to train your willpower muscle to the point of entering the willpower olympics, just slightly stronger than you have now (assuming it is weakened) to enjoy a happier life.

[1] http://www.amazon.com/Willpower-Rediscovering-Greatest-Human...

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mechnik
Recent findings by Carol Dweck and others challenge the prevalent notion that willpower is an exhaustible AND finite resource. She found that the subjects who believed that exercising one's willpower strengthens it rather than depletes it actually increased their willpower. One's mindset was the key. http://www.stanford.edu/~gwalton/home/In_the_News_files/Job,...
ehsanu1
Why can't you believe both? The analogy to muscles and strength training is appropriate here. The day after a workout with very heavy weights, it's hard to lift much at all. So you need to recover.

The thing is that recovery is as important as the actual exercising, because it is during recovery that muscle strength increases. It may be just like that with exercising willpower: it is depleted temporarily, but given time to recover, in the long-term, willpower strengthens.

mechnik
Of course one needs breaks. One interesting point is that people who view their willpower as limitless can be more productive with fewer breaks. Here is an article with comments from the researchers clarifying their findings: http://www.stanforddaily.com/2010/10/25/willpower-can-be-an-...
hammock
She found that the subjects who believed that exercising one's willpower strengthens it rather than depletes it actually increased their willpower.

That to me doesn't discredit the notion that willpower is an exhaustible, finite resource. It merely illuminates a neat psychological trick for increasing your willpower.

mechnik
There is a belief that willpower is finite and exhaustible and nothing will change how much willpower one has, that one cannot increase one's willpower. For example, you only have 25 cents worth of willpower at a certain time and if you spent all of it on not eating a cookie you will not have any left for something else. I suppose if a "trick" increases willpower that proves that willpower is not finite and exhaustible. Clearly there are limits but one's mindset counts for performance.
hammock
My point was the fact that a resource is finite does not mean you can't grow it. If I am a child with a second-grade education- I have a finite amount of knowledge, but there are "tricks" (aka education, development) that I can do to increase my knowledge. If I have a pond in my backyard, there is a finite amount of water it can hold, but if I dredge out a few more hectares, it will store even more groundwater and its capacity has increased while still remaining finite (I cannot drink from it forever).
mechnik
I understand your point about the meaning of 'finite'. My point simply is that those who primarily viewed willpower as a limited resource, finite and exhaustible, did not perform as well as those who believed that exercising willpower increases it. It is not about the nuances of a certain word but how certain attitudes affect performance. Dweck wrote a popular book 'Mindset' where she contrasts 'fixed' mindset with 'growth' mindset. Perhaps 'fixed' makes more sense than 'finite' here. More information at http://mindsetonline.com/
tokenadult
Thanks for the links. I'm always interested to hear about Dweck's latest research.

From the submitted article, this passage is food for thought: "The disasters reveal a limitation of the muscle metaphor: certain evolutionarily prepared drives seem to withstand even the most bulked-up powers of will. The authors note that people with the highest levels of self-control are only slightly better than average at controlling their weight, and they describe disturbing experiments that confirm the old saying 'When the penis stands up, the brains get buried' (it sounds better in Yiddish)."

It would be interesting to test, by methodologies proposed by Dweck or by others, just how far willpower can go in controlling the most biologically driven behaviors. There are, of course, some problems with the ethics of human experimentation involved in setting up some of these experiments in rigorous fashion.

mechnik
I imagine the findings might be statistically significant but the proverb will generally hold. Incidentally, I googled the proverb and it does sound better (funnier) in Yiddish: Ven der putz shteht, ligt der sechel in drerd
zcid
I think that the problem is that we are looking at "willpower" as a general skill when we should see it as more specific to the task. I have built up quite a bit of resistance to certain desires like food and television, but I still flounder when it comes to other areas of my life.

I would be very interested in long-term studies that attempt to build willpower in just one area and then examine the individual's ability to apply that self-control to another, separate task.

mechnik
According to the OP (Pinker's book review) "He enrolled students in regimens that required them to keep track of their eating, exercise regularly, use a mouse with their weaker hand or (one that really gave them a workout) speak in complete sentences and without swearing. After several weeks, the students were more resistant to ego depletion in the lab and showed greater self-control in their lives. They smoked, drank and snacked less, watched less television, studied more and washed more dishes."
Jun8
"certain evolutionarily prepared drives seem to withstand even the most bulked-up powers of will..."

From Kung Fu: When Grasshopper feels the first stirrings of love (and sexual needs), he remembers his teacher's guidance on the subject: "To suppress a truth is to give it force beyond endurance".

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